24 January 2008

Texas Education Agency and Chris Comer, Part 28

The Washington Independent has an article that focuses on Arkansas and its former governor and current American presidential candidate Mike Huckabee. It refers a bit to Chris Comer's situation in Texas:

Chris Comer, who held the same position in the Texas schools, was not so lucky. The Texas Department of Education forced out Comer in November after she forwarded an email to colleagues about an upcoming speech by a pro-evolution philosopher. Her boss, Lizette Reynolds, whom George W. Bush had hired while governor of Texas, called her on the carpet and removed her. “I’ll never get hired in Texas education again,” she said. ...

The removal of Comer was deeply preoccupying to Fulton and other biology teachers, both because was a manifestly unjust, stupid act (Emphasis added. -ZF), and because Texas science textbooks are used by Arkansas and other states. “All Chris did was forward an email, which is exactly what my boss wouldn’t have wanted me to do and exactly what I would have done,” Fulton said. “It could have been me.”

The most disturbing part of the article for me was that it claims fully 10% of teachers teach pure creationism. Now, the article doesn't say whether those are public school teachers, because that would be illegal. I suppose it's possible those 10% belong to private schools.